So He Won't Break
by Vheissu
Summary: Even possessed apostates need a break sometimes. A bit of solo Anders introspection followed by the kind of unannounced visit only Hawke seems to be able to get away with. Unadulterated fluffiness to come, sometimes it just seems like Anders really needs a hug. Fair warning: this is the first fic I've ever written, feedback would be loved and welcome.
1. A Much Needed Rest

Despite having sunken below the skyline hours ago, the blasted sun had neglected to take this damnable heat with it. Anders huddled in the corner, trying his best to ignore the sweltering temperatures as he bent over his desk, poring over dozens of correspondences from the fellow mages he hoped to free. Looking for something, anything that could help him with the cause. The hour was quiet, or as quiet as Darktown could be, Coterie barkers, whores plying their trade and the sound of steel ringing off steel as gangs fought over territory comprised the ever-present distant clamour.

The clinic itself was blessedly removed from most of Darktown's more colourful spots and the rumours of a dangerous Grey Warden apostate only served to help matters when it came to his little corner of the undercity. Unfortunately, these things offered little help when it came to rescuing him from the blazing heat, he suspected the multiple foundries dotting these lesser used parts of the city weren't helping the cause. The easy solution would have been to remove his layers upon feather layers of robes and allow the stagnant excuse for a breeze to circulate under his tunic, but that would require taking a break, however brief, from the task at hand. As he was frequently reminded by the inklings of Justice in his head, there was no time to waste on personal frivolities, including but not limited to cooling himself off, when mages Thedas-wide were suffering much, much worse.

It wasn't until a bead of sweat rolled neatly down the straight bridge of his nose to plop directly into the middle of the letter in front of him that he decided it was time to take some sort of action. With a sigh, he pushed back in the chair, stretching out his aching limbs. He had no clue how long he'd been at this, but, judging by the overflowing basket of letters he'd already gone through and the pitch black of the sky outside, it was probably a while.

He could give himself a little break, couldn't he? Just a moment of respite, for comfort's sake, after all, he'd be no good to anyone's cause if they found him sprawled on the floor in the morning, having dropped dead of heat exhaustion at some point in the evening.

Ignoring the internal buzz of Justice, complaining somewhere in his core, Anders retrieved the tub from the back of the clinic and began to fill it with water. A nice little dip, just a quick one to cool off and he'd get right back to the grind.

Ordinarily he would have fussed around with setting up a partition before bathing, but given the hour and the relative stillness in the clinic, he wasn't worried about anyone barging in looking for his assistance. With things going the way they had been with the Templars lately, less and less people had been willing to risk coming to the clinic for anything save the gravest emergencies. This excluded, of course, Hawke and the peculiar company she kept, but even she'd been curiously absent with this heat wave, presumably busy getting the runaround from the Viscount again. Kirkwallers seemed to stir up more trouble for themselves in the heat than any other time of year, nobles just didn't know how to deal with any shift in their routines.

As he waited for the small tub to fill with water, he began to disrobe. A few quick motions were enough to undo the buckles of his robes and soon enough he was sliding his heavy, feathered mantle off his aching shoulders to fold neatly on his bed. The irony of lifting a burden from his shoulders was not lost on him as he smiled wryly to himself and continued the process. Before long he was down to his breeches and the tub was simply brimming. Seating himself gingerly on the side, so as not to tip it over, he peered into the water, the barely familiar face he'd grown accustomed to stared wearily back at him. Caught up in his work, he'd been neglecting to shave his stubble, manage his hair, sleep; this faraway stare of exhaustion was apparently his new look.

Even Hawke had remarked on how tired he looked, the last time she'd taken him out to the coast. This, he suspected, was the reason she hadn't come calling on him of late. He could never tell her as much, but he enjoyed when she needed him, if for no other reason than as a welcome distraction from his own personal crusade. He would be fooling himself if he thought for a second the distraction was the only reason he enjoyed it. No, it was much more than that but he could hardly tell her that, let alone admit it to himself without facing the implications given his…situation.

Frustrated, he plunged his hand into he water, distorting the reflection into a grotesque caricature of himself, which was not so far off from how he felt about his appearance lately. The water was still too warm to the touch; especially given the mood he'd gotten himself into. With a quick gesture, Anders summoned a blast of frost to sufficiently cool the water before discarding his final layer and slipping in.

The water enveloped him like a frosty lover, at once cool and comforting. Were it any colder out, he might have minded the chill, but his body temperature was currently skyrocketing so far through the roof it may as well have been in Hightown so he didn't mind. Sliding deeper into the metal tub, he leaned his head back against the side, closing his eyes and allowing himself the small freedom of letting some tension flow from his remarkably tense frame.

This action, evidently, worked too well. He must have caved to the exhaustion and slipped off to sleep at some point because suddenly the water was back to lukewarm, his toes had the tell tale pruned feeling of someone who's been in water too long.

That and he was no longer alone.


	2. Shedding Some Light

"Ferelden was never this hot!" Lamented a very, very warm Hawke who had disappeared up to the waist in the dark recesses of a wardrobe. The better part of her clothing selection was rapidly piling behind her, everything having been deemed far too thick for the weather. "I can't even look at wool without sweating right now."

"I think you should just stop this nonsense and get into some of my clothes instead." The Rivaini woman purred, stretched out on the Hightown estate's oversized bed with elbows propping her up for a better view of Hawke's struggles. The remark, not wanting for the pirate's trademark suggestive undertones, earned her an exaggerated eye roll from the half-clothed mage in front of her.

"I don't think anything of yours would fit me, Isabela." Hawke laughed, leaning back far enough from her journey into the depths of the wardrobe to gesture at the ampleness of her chest, which was significantly less than what the pirate boasted.

Isabela chuckled and moved to slide herself off of the bed with a languid grace Hawke herself could only dream of possessing. "That wasn't necessarily what I meant." She cooed, in the teasing fashion Hawke had grown accustomed to receiving, and brushing off, from her friend. "But I'm here to help, so let me help. No one knows how to dress for the heat quite like I do."

This practice of rooting through Hawke's closet was a favourite of Isabela's, the routine always played out the same and Hawke braced herself appropriately for it. First would come the rooting, then the comments about drab Ferelden fashion summarized by Isabela taking a pair of scissors to no less than three of her robes, making much more fashionable micro-robes, as the Rivaini affectionately termed them. There was no point in protesting once Isabela put her mind to something.

"I'm going to regret this, but if you insist," stepping aside to give the pirate clear access to the ravaged wardrobe, Hawke allowed the floodgates to open. For the next while, the air in the master bedroom was thick with robes and practical linen undergarments flying about willy nilly.

"That is a dressing gown, Isabela, I barely wear it out of my bedroom," The first article deemed decent by Isabela was a barely-there maroon robe that skimmed the tops of her thighs and offered only a small sash to keep her modest. No amount of insistence was going to have Hawke walking out of the mansion in that. "I'm certainly not leaving the house in it, try something else."

A great deal of self-control and refusing to allow Isabela to physically put the clothes onto her body, and Hawke had finally donned a layer beyond smallclothes that didn't have her pouring sweat. "I still think you could do without the trousers," Isabela remarked of the linen lace-up breeches the mage had donned with the tunic the pirate had suggested she wear solo, "you know half of our expedition would love to watch those shapely legs taking the lead."

"Mm, of course," Hawke laughed, "you aren't just trying to pass your own filthy thoughts off as someone else's."

"Me? Never!" This elicited a genuine throaty laugh from Isabela, who continued, "Oh, I'm not denying I'd follow those legs into a dragon's den." Unable to resist the urge to have the final word, she added, "Just saying I can think of a certain renegade mage feels much the same, I'd stake a bet on that."

Hawke had never made a hastier exit, but even she wasn't fast enough to keep the pirate from catching a glimpse of the pink flush spreading hotly up her face. They had business to attend to and Hawke would much rather rush to meet a Coterie blade than suffer a slow, mortified death at Isabela's taunting hands.

* * *

Linen breeches and a tunic had not proved the most sensible battle gear, how Isabela moved the way she did in a miniskirt was beyond her comprehension. She had found herself overcompensating on the swings of a staff to avoid tangling in her usual robes that simply weren't there. One rather large arc had allowed just enough space for a Coterie assassin to get close to her flank with twin blades. A good mind blast was enough to send him flying before he'd had a chance to do any serious damage. Fortunately, Fenris' well-placed hand - phased through their leader's chest, to be specific - was enough to put an end to things.

It was late by the time they wrapped up their business in the shadier part of Kirkwall and a large, red spot was ballooning slowly around the wound Hawke had incurred. Her own clumsy healing magic had been enough to keep it together thus far, but evidently wasn't going to do the trick in the long turn. When the party parted ways, Fenris, ever concerned about their leader's well-being, offered to escort her back to Hightown in her injured state. Hawke politely declined, leaving Isabela promising to walk Fenris home safely, with a wink shot over her shoulder.

That was roughly how Hawke found herself alone in Darktown, a hand pressed to her side, shooting the occasional blast of healing magic to keep things under control. A health poultice and a long rest would surely have done the trick, but she was down here already after all and the clinic was down here already, really it just made perfect sense, it would have been silly of her to trek all the way back to Hightown when there was a perfectly good healer a stone's throw away. This was the rationale she used to propel her journey to the underground clinic.

The beautiful view of the giant chains hanging above the canal was almost completely obscured in darkness as she passed by, the hour was clearly later than she had realized. Having come this far, however, there really wasn't a point in turning back now. Hawke had known Anders to take patients in the dead of night, she hoped he'd do the same for her. He had before, of course, but she hadn't been to see him in a while and he'd only seemed busier than ever the last few times she had.

Hawke released her wound, shifting her staff from hand to hand, not wanting to leave a bloody handprint wherever she knocked, though a closer examination of those doors would have told her one more bloody smear wouldn't make a big difference in the Darktown décor. When there was no answer, she almost turned around and doubled back, but stopped herself. It was a quiet knock, maybe he just hadn't heard her. Knocking again, slightly harder this time, she waited patiently for an answer that didn't come.

It always worried her when no one answered the door at the clinic, Anders was almost always there and if he weren't, some other Ferelden refugee would be handy to pass her message along. Tonight was apparently going to be the exception. A tight feeling gripped her gut as she knocked one more time, more forcefully than the first two. This time, the door swung slowly open under her fist and she found herself truly nervous. Every day was a new worry for a mage living in Kirkwall, but particularly for one with Anders' chosen lifestyle. Renegade apostate operating the mages' underground right under their nose was not something Templars were known to take lightly.

"Hello?" She called softly into the black room, hearing nothing but her own voice echoing faintly back at her she feared the worst. Hawke pushed in past the open door, treading lightly as she examined the dark clinic for signs of life, or worse; signs of struggle. A locked door and an empty clinic was one thing, but Anders would never leave the door open with his clinic unattended, the information he kept hidden here was far too valuable to their resistance.

"Anders?" The desk where she knew he kept a cluster of candles wasn't far from where she stood. Making her way to it clumsily, she tried calling out his name again, louder this time. Her hip bumped up against the desk and she stooped to sweep her hands over it, trying not to shuffle the papers too much in her search for the candle. Over the shuffling, she could have sworn a noise came from the back of the clinic. Stopping to listen closer, the suspicion was affirmed, a strange sloshing noise happened once, twice.

In a flash, Hawke had turned on her heel, summoning a lick of flame to her hand faster than her reflexes would typically allow with a wound weeping down her side. The mountain of half-melted candles flickered to life under her touch, their dim light sweeping across the floor to help illuminate the clinic that apparently wasn't so empty after all. Standing in battle stance with her staff outstretched, Hawke allowed her eyes a moment to adjust, still squinting at the noise.

A few things quickly came to light with the candles shedding a bit of light of their own on the situation. One, the clinic was not nearly as empty as Hawke had previously thought. Two, the subtle sound erupted into a full blown commotion at the back of the clinic and the mystery unraveled itself as a very naked Anders emerged in a frenzy from a very small tub.


	3. Breaking the Tension

There was someone in the clinic; an unexpected guest in the dark at this hour could only mean one thing. Only seconds ago he had awoken to a soft shuffling that stopped so suddenly he could have dreamt it. For all his careful planning, it seemed his moment's rest would be his unraveling. Templars, what else could it be? They had finally found him; they had probably caught on sooner than this and just waited for him to let his guard down. What a fool he was. Naked and unarmed, Anders quietly braced himself in the small tub to be barreled over by a Smite or worse, enveloped in a Silence spell. He could feel Justice raging beneath the surface, desperate to emerge, to fight, but now was not the time. Not yet.

His fears were quite abruptly put to rest, however, when the telltale tingle of magic sparked the air. This was no Templar. The familiarity of the magic sunk in a second too late and the world seemed to come together all at once. No, this was definitely not a Templar. This was a Hawke and he was naked, as in naked-naked, very incredibly naked. In a last ditch effort to protect his modesty, Anders leapt from his bath in a manner no one would clamor to call graceful. Much to his dismay, Hawke's flame spell proved faster and more effective than his dive. He found himself wishing he'd just stayed in the tub and rode it out, a thought that unfortunately came a bit too late as his toe hooked its side, sending it, and the water contained, clattering after him in a wave calling more attention to himself.

"Andraste's flaming knickers, Hawke!" He exclaimed, frantically moving his hands to cover his unmentionables as he staggered around the back of the dimly lit clinic, desperately trying to find the breeches currently eluding him.

It was at this moment that Anders found himself quite thankful for the terrible lighting in Darktown hovels or Hawke may have been privy to the pink tinge flushing over his skin from head to toe. Until now, he wasn't sure it was possible to blush all over. A few fleeting glimpses told him the Champion of Kirkwall remained by his desk, mouth agape and staff still pointed in the familiar battle ready stance. As he continued to forage for his breeches, she had cast her eyes to the ground and began mumbling apologies of all varieties, steadily going back and forth with his own half-breathed ones of humiliation.

"I am so sorry."

"Don't look!"

"I didn't think anyone was here."

"Just a second…"

"I am so sorry!"

"Where in the Void are my pants?"

"The door was open."

"I really should have locked that door…"

"I just got so worried."

"I am _so_ sorry you have to see this, Hawke!"

"So sorry."

Hawke continued her tirade of apologies, the pair of them practically talking over each other, barely heard by Anders over the roar of his pulse delivering the heart attack that promised to kill him. Finally, a crumpled pair of breeches revealed themselves, drenched from the knees down as a casualty of the overturned tub but they would do in a pinch. Lacing up the half sodden bottoms, he sighed. They clung uncomfortably to his calves but if he survived this embarrassment, he could survive that.

"I'm so sorry. I should—" Hawke was clearly struggling with whether or not she should be making a hasty exit, standing halfway between the desk and the door, lifting her eyes only to stare out the open doorway into the corridors beyond. "I should probably just go, right? Yeah, I should just go."

"No, stay!" Anders said rather too abruptly, continuing, "I mean, you don't have to leave. You came down here for something." His voice kept coming out half-strangled; hitting a pitch somewhere in the middle he hadn't heard since he was about thirteen and in the tower. He started to move toward her across the clinic, the wet bottoms of his breeches clinging to one another making a soft sucking sound with each step he took. In light of the situation, he tried to ignore it, not wishing to suffer any further embarrassment, but Hawke, as it seemed, could not.

Peals of giggles suddenly erupted from the mage now standing in the doorway, effectively breaking the tension they hadn't realized was so thick in the air. Anders stood stupidly in the middle of the room for a moment before Hawke's contagious laughter took hold of him, eliciting the kind of genuine smile only she could coax from him. Just two giddy apostates having a fit in the middle of his top-secret hideout. Perfectly normal stuff.

"I'm so sorry," she managed through the giggles, "just, your pants."

Looking down, he could see what she found so hilarious. Aside from the delightful noises they had decided to make when he moved, the wet bits were clinging tightly to his lower legs, making the top appear puffy and ballooned out. Chicken legs ready to be served up on Feastday. Exactly how he wanted to look in front of the woman he…admired platonically.

He noticed then that she wasn't garbed in her usual robes, but had donned something lighter and certainly more form fitting. That familiar ache – the sort you feel for very friendly friends that are nothing more than friends – was threatening to well up in his chest when something else caught his eye. Her free hand had been tightly clutching the same spot on her side since she'd relaxed her battle ready posture. Even with the poor lighting, he recognized the glisten on her fingers and the dark stain down her side to be blood. Spotting wounds from a mile away was the occupational hazard of being a healer.

"Maker, Hawke," he sighed, running a hand through his still damp hair, "come over here." When she stubbornly stayed put, he closed the distance between them in a few short strides, closing his own hand around her fingers covered in blood both dry and slick. Her wince when he did so was not lost on him. "Who did this? What happened?"

"It's fine, we had some business with the Coterie, run of the mill stuff. I was just a little careless." Whenever a Hawke told him they were being a little careless, he had learned to take it with a grain of salt. A little careless in their family could range anywhere from not looking both ways before they cross a trail to running naked into a crowd of Hurlocks. "We got the bastards. I can just put a poultice on it when I get home, it's just I was down here already and—"

"You should have taken me with you tonight," he said softly. Anders cursed himself then for his unavailability of late, if he wasn't so preoccupied all the time, she would have taken him out tonight, he could have prevented this, or at least been there to help her. With his hand still resting over hers, he lifted his eyes to meet her sheepish gaze, "I can't let you walk home like this. Please, stay, let me take care of it."


	4. Just a Distraction

Whatever she'd been expecting this was certainly not it. Templars, raiders, brigands, slavers, there was a rather comprehensive laundry list of threats she braced herself to encounter on a regular basis but this was not on it. Though it may not have been completely accurate to say she'd have preferred to find herself in one of those situations rather than the present one, it wouldn't have been completely inaccurate either. Being a woman of action, Hawke was always ready to charge in and deal with a situation head first, but this particular surprise was not one a swing of a staff and some well-aimed offensive spells could solve. There wasn't a spell in the world for this.

Unable to magic herself out of the predicament, she would have to deal with it – it being her first time seeing a naked man that wasn't five year old Carver in the bathtub with her and Bethany, seeing a naked man she was actually _attracted_ to – the way an ordinary human dealt with things. Some good old fashioned stammering and great deals of backing away like a frightened animal. The way mature adults deal with things. Anders' embarrassment was blessedly on par with hers, a fact that made the whole debacle marginally more tolerable. It was still nowhere near tolerable enough to save her from wanting to crawl into the nearest hole and die, just enough to ward off the risk of melting into the floor here and now.

Fumbling over her words as the pair of them spewed fragmented apologies at one another, she wished she was more eloquent, someone like Varric would know just what to say. But she was alone in mustering anything halfway sensible in this distracted state.

She wanted to say she didn't look, but that wouldn't have been _entirely _true. Call it a morbid curiosity but masochistic would be more accurate. An image of Anders so unguarded would provide the perfect ammunition for her mind to torment her with. Not that it needed a proper image to go by, it seemed her brain had no problem coming up with visions of Anders to haunt her with all on its own. The waking hours in the dead of night when the rest of the mansion had long since fallen asleep were peppered with thoughts of the apostate as it was. Left alone in her room with a bed three sizes too large for her alone, she would watch the fire flicker and dance, conjuring the face of someone she could never have to peer back at her. Some nights she could even imagine his voice, whispering her name in the hush of wind fluttering her balcony curtains. For all her desire to push those thoughts down, file them away under nonessentials, she knew this was one that would give her many restless nights to come.

She tried to keep her eyes on the ground, she really did, but when Anders turned away from her to lace up his breeches, what else could she do? _Not_ look at the way beads of water trailed from his hair, running the indented path between his broad shoulders? Ignore the way his muscles shifted beneath the skin as his hands worked in front of him? Pretend she couldn't see the slight swell of his cute bu– Shit, he was turning around.

Hawke flew from the desk to the doorway so fast a Wyvern couldn't have caught her, not wanting to be caught ogling the resident healer. There, she rapidly busied herself with finding something fascinating to observe at the clinic's exterior. The view may have suffered greatly for it, but at least provided her and Anders to maintain some shred of dignity. After interrupting the poor man's moment of solace, the least she could do was pretend she wasn't eyeing him up and down like a well-prepared steak.

When the commotion began to settle, leaving the two mages standing awkwardly staring at one another, a nervous energy bubbled up inside of Hawke. Sure, Anders' pants may have been on the hilarious side, but she might have contained herself ordinarily. Instead, the giddiness welled up inside her bubbled over in a fit of giggles. Very, very mature, she scolded herself. Anders didn't seem too troubled though, breezing right past the event as his eyes fell to her wound.

There was a visible shift in his demeanor then, in mere seconds he was at her side, his hand clasped over hers and she was left staring dumbstruck. Attempts to play the situation off as unimportant fell flat in the wake of his intense gaze locked on her own.

_"Please, stay, let me take care of it." _

For all the times she'd imagined this situation, the one in which he asked her to stay instead of running her off, it was never like this. Of course, she was confident he meant it in the most professional of capacities, but that didn't stop the blood from rushing to her face. Pink as a petal, she dropped her gaze to his hand, a silent nod of reassurance was all it took. Before she knew it, Anders had his fingers twined gently in hers, leading her to the cot she knew to be his, pushed back in the far corner of the room.

With a complete disregard she'd never seen from him, Anders pushed his robe and feathered pauldrons from the bed to the floor, clearing a space for her to sit, which she accepted. Almost immediately, he began to fuss with a tray of salves and dressings sitting by the adjacent bed. Unsure of what to do next, Hawke perched herself on the edge of the bed, her posture was rigid, speaking volumes of her discomfort.

If he had asked her, she couldn't have said why this time was different. How many times had she been down here? Sitting on patiently on a cot while Anders worked his magic, quite literally. This time _was_ different though. _He_ was different. Instead of the Justice haunted Anders she'd come to know, she seemed to have intruded on a rare moment of a pure and simple Anders she found herself quite taken by.

Her thoughts were interrupted by his voice breaking through the relative silence. Apparently he'd said something and she had completely missed it. Brilliant.

"Sorry, what?" She asked, grabbing at her side with a fake wince for a bit of show, feigning that the injury was the reason for her distraction and hoping he'd be none the wiser.

Anders, quite red in the face himself, cleared his throat and tried again, "The wound, um…I need to…"

"You need?" Hawke started, staring stupidly until her brain caught up with her. The little gesture he made at the hem of her tunic admittedly helped to jog her train of thought a bit. "Oh, yeah, of course, yes."

With shaking fingers, she pushed the tunic up just enough to expose the bulk of the wound to him. Not high enough and she knew it, but she'd be hard pressed to go the extra mile and lift it all the way to reveal the wound extending from just beneath her breast band and beyond.

Leaning forward to study the injury closer, Anders began cleaning the area, methodically dipping a small cloth into warm water to sponge away some of the blood around the wound. He was just doing his job as a healer, a damn good one in Hawke's experience, but that didn't stop Hawke from holding her breath when he reached the place where her tunic still hung over the wound. "May I?" he asked softly, his fingers playing at the edge of her shirt. At a loss for words herself, Hawke simply nodded.


	5. To Feel Something

Every fiber of his being was currently screaming at him to practice caution and professionalism as his fingers danced across the seam of Hawke's tunic. For all the times he had been her healer, it had never felt like anything more, though he was always painfully aware of her proximity, it was never like _this. _The fact that he still hadn't bothered to put a shirt on may have had something to do with it, but he was less worried about that at this point in time and more worried about the wound still trickling blood down his leader's side. The soft, fair flesh of her shapely side….

Reminding himself once again to remain the picture of professionalism, Anders pushed the linen tunic up farther, revealing the full expanse of her stomach which in and of itself proved almost too much for him.

"I need you to lay back, Hawke," he started, placing a free hand lightly on her shoulder to punctuate the statement and ease the strain the motion might put on her stomach muscles, "if you don't mind."

Another silent nod of acquiescence from Hawke before she stretched herself back on the cot. Most of the time you couldn't pay the woman to keep her peace, a fact he loved about her, but it only proved how out of character the evening was shaping up to be. He really needed to snap out of this mindset if he was going to keep his cool and see this through. Wound. Blood. Focus. Worry more about the injured woman and less about the perfectly flat planes of her well-toned stomach trailing down to that perfect little dip of her hip. No, that was not focusing. At least Justice had courteously bowed out for the evening; he couldn't deal with another voice chiding him besides his own.

In the dim lighting of the clinic, he had to pull himself in close to see. The wound was still open, still bleeding, but that was most likely a symptom of Hawke's stubbornness, there didn't seem to be any lasting damage. Pulling himself together and placing a hand over her silky skin, Anders drew from his mana pool to channel energy in a slow, soothing stream. Beneath his fingers, he could feel the flesh shifting, moving ever so slightly under his command, and knitting itself back together. She might be a bit tender in the morning, but she'd be a far cry from bleeding and fit for light battle. Anders often wondered if every battle was a light battle for Hawke, the way she dispatched her enemies with effortless grace. As much as he hated to see her hurt, it was a reminder of how mortal she really was, and _he _was.

Sharing his existence with a spirit, he found himself forgetting more often than not that he was still human, still a man. Without fail, it was always Hawke that brought him back to himself. Sometimes he worried without Hawke he may have fallen to pieces long ago, she was the only thing that kept him steady, on track. She was the main supporter in his futile quest for freedom, equality. The cause had become as much about her as it was all mages, it would kill him to see this woman locked up under Templar command. That thought was enough to give Justice cause to stir, even hiding in the recesses of his mind; the image of Hawke silenced and clapped in irons was too much. He pushed the thoughts away and steadied his hand once again to maintain the channeled heal.

Hawke seemed visibly more relaxed than when he'd started, stretched out on the small cot with her eyes closed. Maker, she was beautiful. He couldn't help but stare at her, the small smile that played across her lips as he slid his hands up along the wound, double-checking for anywhere he may have missed. Judging by her serene expression, he hadn't missed anything, or she'd be wincing. The time had come for him to stop, to escort her back to her mansion, but his hands were unwilling to obey. With a mind of their own, they continued to play along the now closed wound, under the pretense of being thorough. He didn't want this to end the way it always did, a chaste goodbye and a long walk back to an empty clinic.

He wondered how much of the distance between them was his own doing? Though he felt it to be a conjuring of his own desperate mind, there always seemed to be something between them. Every flirtation, every coy glance across a table at the Hanged Man, wasn't it always him who left first? What would happen if he didn't chase her off, just once? Would it be so bad to let himself be a man first and a martyr second, even for a single night?

So lost in thought, following the lines of the fresh pink scar on her stomach with his fingertips, Anders neglected to notice that those bright eyes he found himself so enamored with were currently peering at him. Startled, he was about to push away from her, come up with another blundering excuse before sending her off, but a slender had hand slipped over his own before he could find the opportunity. Raising his own gaze to meet hers, he found himself searching her eyes for something he wasn't sure he'd even recognize at this point. There was something there though, something undeniable, a softness reserved only for him.

"Anders," she started softly, moving to prop herself up, "thank you. That feels incredible."

The hush in her voice stirred something deep within him, the passion that had him striving to see Hawke as nothing more than a friend, a travelling companion. That deep seated longing that couldn't be quelled and would only threaten to consume him should he ever acknowledge its existence openly. But the more he shared these fleeting, fragile moments with Hawke, the harder it was to bury again. 


End file.
